But when you peek behind the new “Don’t Tread on Me” flags, some of the local Tea Party and 912 Project groups are looking more like the same old political factions.

When you sign up for e-mail from the supposedly nonpartisan Common Sense Texans network of Tea Party members, you’re giving your address to a Dallas Republican lawyer and social-networking-campaign expert who has been an activist for private-school vouchers.

Turns out I’m not the only person who’s leery of these fake grassroots activist groups sprouting on every block.

Robert Butler is the new state Libertarian Party executive director. He sounded frustrated Tuesday.

“The Libertarians started this thing, and now Republicans want to get ahead of the parade and take it over,” Butler said by phone from Austin.

“Their brand name is held in such disregard that they’ve started marketing under the Tea Party banner. Then, behind the scenes, their organizers are getting in there and co-opting the Tea Parties.”

Butler, a former Republican who switched parties in 2003, is particularly burned about the Dallas Tea Party. That group also operates the Grapevine-based NE Tarrant Tea Party, one of at least four Tea Party groups serving the Keller-Grapevine-Southlake area.

“We have evidence that Republicans are using the Dallas Tea Party to collect names and information,” Butler said.

For example, the Web site commonsensetexans.net, a sign-up and information site for 34 Tea Party and 912 Project groups in Texas, is registered to Dallas lawyer and Tea Party coordinator Ken Emanuelson, a Fred Thompson campaigner and veteran Republican organizer.

The Dallas Tea Party has not included Libertarians in events since July 4, Butler said.

About one-third of Tea Party attendees generally claim libertarian views, Butler said. The split usually comes on religious issues such as gay marriage, where the Libertarian Party opposes government involvement.

Agreed Vortex. If the Tea Party folks are serious about cutting spending, they will have to consider the possibility of slashing the defense budget and ask serious questions like why are we pouring out billions to defense contractors while being told it is our charitable duty to provide toys for the children of soldiers stationed abroad. I’m not going to hold my breath for these questions to be asked.

Over the years, the LP has had one thing that made it better than all
other parties. It’s the one thing that made it stand out, and which
made it the only viable option for making peaceful change in America
and that thing is our libertarian principles.

Last weekend those principles were sold out. There was a transparant
plan on the part of a small pro-war minority in the party to take over
and toss our principles out the window. They planned this cruise to
exclude as many real libertarians as they could and to outnumber us
and outvote us. They succeeded and now the LP is dead.

M. Carling and his little bitch Aaron Star refused to seat delegates
who filled out the membership application, signed and dated the
pledge, and who paid their membership to not one, but 2 members of the
Ex-Com acting in their official capacity as representatives of the
Libertarian Party of California. Aaron Star said that their
application wasn’t valid because it wasn’t “postmarked” as if that
mattered. There was no written rule requiring a post mark. These
people were told that they were members by an official representative
of the party and bought tickets to the convention based on this, and
the fact that they were told that in the history of the Libertarian
Party of California, no member has ever been refused a seat as a
delegate. M(idget) and Aaron said that they weren’t members for 90
days so they couldn’t be seated. They ignore the fact that Gail
Lightfoot’s son (who wasn’t a member before) registered on the spot at
the last convention and was allowed to be a delegate.

These 2 people were the youngest in the room and were among very few
who weren’t white. I suspect both racial and age descrimination, and
not seating them specifically because they were with me.

They will be taking the LP of CA to court to sue for re-imbursement of
the money they spent on membership, and the more than $400 each they
spent to take the cruise, and I will be a witness for them. This is
another story though.

John Kennedy said, “Those who make peaceful revolution impossible,
make violent revolution inevitable.”

I agree with this and since the door has been closed for peaceful
change by the scummiest, dirtiest, most worthless people ever to join
the LP, I will use the only option I have left. Any blood spilled
will be on their heads.

I have a lot of respect for Rodney Austin, but a lot of this was his
fault. He was on the judicial committee and he allowed this
anti-libertarian cabal to violate our bylaws which state the
convention must be within the state of California or in another state
(aka within the USA) with the involvement of the LP in charge of that
region. Since there is no International LP, having the convention in
International Waters invalidates the entire thing. If Rodney had
actually stuck to the bylaws, they wouldn’t have gotten away with
this… and trust me, they still might not get away with it.

I’m running for Congress, and right now I am considering dropping out.
But before I drop out, I am very tempted to do something so
outrageous and horrific during a televised interview, it would give
the California LP a black eye it might never recover from. I’d rather
see the LP destroyed entirely than to see it misused and have its
principles tossed out the window.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Hmmm, maybe instead of doing something himself, what he did was get Matthew Barnes recruited to replace him as San Bernadino County Chair?

Joey , your an arrogant douche sometimes , I mostly like you but come on . Don’t put Starchild and that child molester together in the same sentence , there is NO comparison between the two Its just rude.

This what I’ve feared for awhile a Neocon take over of Ron Paul’s movement. Libertarians need to push the the non-interventionist message along with the anti-tax message. I’ve read articles in which Libertarians have chosen not to bring up foreign policy in order to coexist with Conservatives. I say enough is enough, because you can’t control the size of government when your crusading all over the damm planet. It’s time for Libertarians to stand up to Conservative statists and Interventionists before it’s too late or we will be back to where we started. Here is a C4L article that I think you guys should read.

Since it is fairly obvious that none of the California Executive Committee members traveled to a meeting place this last weekend, this seems to indicate an e-mail vote as permitted in their Bylaws, right next to the 120 hour voting window requirement for such an action.

Also note that suspension requires a 2/3 vote.

This demonstrates fairly definitively that Mr. Cohen is completely out of touch with the workings of the California State Party, as it is almost certain that the same group he condemns for lack of action were already in the midst of decision when he made his accusations. It demonstrates further that his claims above amount to little more than him ranting out his ass when he claims that the members of the Executive Committee, some members of whom he invoked by name, were “privately and tacitly” supporting “Matthew the Child Molester”, as obviously a supermajority of them acted in exactly the opposite manner.

As they say, actions speak louder than words. No matter how loudly those words are shouted.

Given his history of histrionics, contrasted with an impressive surge in fundraising and networking activity within the California party, I believe it is safe to say that Mr. Cohen is little more than a raving lunatic with an axe to grind. No doubt his dramatic display of verbal vitriol only hastened his inevitable inglorious removal in the same breath as such scum as that disgusting and deplorable pederast.

#17, what makes you believe they should have done it sooner, other than your Cartman-like distaste for Jews? If you can find an answer to that, you may find your answer to why they chose to remove him. If not, you may want to reexamine your assumptions.

#3, I cannot fault the CA leadership on their treatment of this situation. They acted with caution to protect Barnes in case it was a false accusation (something I was concerned enough about to go into L.A. myself and look at the file), and they acted with decisiveness once they had all the facts and were certain of their authority under the CA by-laws.

#5, Barnes was never chair of SBC. He was vice chair. Sorry. But thanks for playing.

#10, If you sincerely believe Starchild’s defending boy scout leaders molesting scouts under their leadership on camping trips, why not ask him point blank instead of making these assumptions and assertions to cause drama?